The Beginnings of Buddhist Art and Other Essays in Indian and Central-Asian Archaeology c6.27

c6.27

V. As we cannot see all in detail, I will detain you only a moment with the fifth *jâtaka*, spoken (and even written) of as « of the Quail ». As usual, the text (*Jât.* 357) indicates first of all on what occasion the fable was related. It was not the first time that Dêvadatta, the traitor cousin of Buddha and the Judas Iscariot of his legend, proved the hardness of his heart. At that time the Bodhisattva was born in the form of an elephant, chief of a troop of 80,000 others — India is very fond indeed of this round number. A quail, which had made her nest within their pasture ground and whose young, scarcely hatched, were still incapable of moving, begs him to spare her offspring. He willingly consents to this, and by his orders his 80,000 subjects respect the young birds as they file past : doubtless, this is what they are in the act of doing on the right lower part of the medallion (pl. V, 1). But he warns the quail that a fierce solitary is following him. The latter, deaf to all prayers, crushes the nest : you perceive one of the young ones under his right hind foot, exactly on the edge of the break in the stone, whilst the weeping mother is perched on a tree in front of him. But vengeance is not long delayed : for already on the bulging forehead of the cruel elephant a crow is busy, pecking out his eyes with its beak, whilst a big « blue fly » deposits its eggs in the sockets. A third ally of the quail, its gossip the frog, is seated at the top of the medallion in a conventional rocky landscape. Its role, in the story as on the bas-relief, is by its croaking to attract the enormous animal, which is blind and burning with fever, by making it believe in the proximity of water. Thus it leads him right to the edge of a sharp precipice, where he falls headlong : only his hind part has not yet quite disappeared into the abyss. Application : the Bodhisattva was the leader of the troop of elephants, Dêvadatta was the solitary. — « Well, what about the quail », you will ask. — You desire to know too much.